In My World, There's You
by sweet-and-simple
Summary: "I am no prince, or even a knight in shining armor.  More or less, you could say I am the evil wizard bent on making the princess mine.  So will you let me capture you and keep you, my princess?"  69fem!27 female!27 fm!27 6927
1. My Name Is Whore

Sawada Tsunako, first year student at Kokuyo High. She was small, shy, cute, not smart but intuitive, not brave but loyal, not innocent but angelic – the little ways of describing her. She was usually identified for her messy head of thick, springy copper locks that swept down her spine to the small of her back. If not that, then her caramel eyes were usually unforgettable, how expressive and wide they were.

Men could recall her by her blush and pretty, untouchable mouth.

Women recalled her by her timid kindness.

"Hey, you're Mukuro-kun's girlfriend!" A girl stuck a pose in front of her desk, glaring down at her like she was shit stuck to the bottom of her shoe.

Tsunako flushed and tilted her head down. "Yeah…" _'Please'_, she begged within herself, _'please don't look at me like that.'_

Sawada Tsunako, in every second that she had to attend school, wished over and over again that she could make other people disappear with a thought. She was too kind to actually say so or entertain the thought for long, but it was always there like a black stain on her white robe. She couldn't help it.

The boys who attended Namimori were always trying to talk her into doing bad things with them. Knowing that she was already in a relationship, they would try to feed her lies of how much they liked her or they would flatter her and get her cheap gifts (but only after saying that they cost an arm and a leg), all in an attempt to get her to have sex with them. There had been three grievances where she had been cornered by gangs of guys she had known and had just barely gotten away from with her virtue intact.

But, for all that, the girls were easily worse. Because Tsunako unintentionally attracted their boyfriends or was cuter than them in whatever way they perceived, they tried their hardest to make her life a living hell.

Like burning her school uniform while she was in gym class – or carving curse words and revolting names into her desk when she was out of the room. They threw things at her and said things behind her back about how much of a whore she was and they would try to estimate just how many diseases she had and how many guys she had screwed. In Biology, they made continuous efforts to lock her in the classroom alone with her homeroom sensei, Birds-Sensei, who was less than subtle about his desires to spread Tsunako across his desk and hurt her. No, he made it less than subtle; more than once, he had masturbated under the desk while staring at her, the vulgar sounds of him jacking off making her want to vomit.

And there were so many other ways that they tried to make her life hell – like how they once tried to push her into an oven during culinary class. Or when they had chased her up trees and kept her there overnight. One of their favorite games to play was How Many Cars Can Tsunako Dodge Before She Gets Run Over? The answer, luckily for Tsunako (or was it unluckily? Every time she was forced to participate, she became more and more willing to stand still and just wait and see), was so far unknown.

So wasn't it okay that she had bad thoughts about other people?

Especially girls who walked up to her and opened a conversation what that question, that same question every time, like Tsunako wasn't even her own person but an object that belonged to another.

"I don't get it." The girl tapped her chin thoughtfully. "Why would Mukuro-kun want something plain and ugly like you over _me_?" With another cutesy tilt of her head, she shrugged and pursed her lips. "Maybe you really _do_ have escort-like skills. Something has to keep him running back to you!"

Then, her duty as a tormentor obviously completed if not overdone, she skipped away. Literally _skipped _away.

Tsunako watched her leave, hands clenched tightly in her skirt.

By now, she really should be used to the bullying. It wasn't like these people were worth listening to o-or reacting to. No, that would m-make them happy… To s-see her upset.

She furiously rubbed her sleeve across her face. Damn them, she'd never done anything wrong to them!

~::~

Halfway down the corridor, she was jerked to a stop by hands on her skirt right before the material was viciously ripped off her hips and left to drift around her ankles.

She stopped breathing as teenagers who had had not been paying her any mind turned to look at her, a sea of eyes swarming to stare at the poor little girl in her white undies.

The same guy who had disarmed her brought a hand back and slapped it hard against her ass. "Tsuna-chan, can't you ever keep your skirt on?"

She was laughed at… So many people, so loud, so hard, so deafening, and evil grins and wicked eyes warped and twirled and twisted into one monstrous being of a hundred ill wills.

Tsunako dropped her books and tried to lift her skirt back up, tried so hard, but another teenager had planted his foot on them and she tripped forward, sprawling across the cold, dirty floor and – and –

_She refused to cry_.

But no one would ever know just how much strength it took to hold back her tears. She bit the inside of her cheek as a hand tangled in her hair and wrenched her head back.

"Hey, Tsuna-chan, while you're down there, why don't you help me out with a problem of mine? Don't worry, it's the kind you're good at taking care of!"

A blur flew out of the ranks of green uniforms and tackled the three guys standing over her – the one that had ripped off her skirt, the second that had stepped on it, and the third that had just been speaking. Where they had been, bloody, slashed things took their places on the floor as her savior turned chilling heterochromic eyes on all the people who had only stood back and watched her get hurt.

Suddenly, all of those demonic leers that had stared down at her, laughed at her, were looking away.

Tsuna shakily sat back on her scuffed knees, shivering and hurt. Her hero wordlessly offered her a gloved hand and she took it as his other came out and picked up her discarded, ruined skirt, the seam ripped and zipper broken.

As silent as the grave, he shouldered off his jacket and wrapped it around her, buttoning up the front. It swamped her, hanging halfway down her thighs, and the warm, damp smell of flowers and mist, so familiar to her, soothed her nerves just the slightest bit. He swung her into his arms like a fairy tale princess and squeezed her to his chest, tucking her face against his heart gently, with so much care it was hard to believe that the man cradling her was also the man holding the corridor in thick terror with just the power of his glower alone.

"R-Rok-k …"

He hushed her gently and stroked his fingers down her cheek.

Every teenager gathered was left to fear what their fates would be as her savior turned on his heel and walked away down the corridor, bodies pressing themselves against the walls as he passed like Moses and the Red Sea.

They left in silence. Were followed by silence.

That silence lasted long after they exited school grounds.

~::~

"Scumbags like them don't bother listening to what others have to say," Her hero murmured. "They only listen to people they're afraid of."

Mukuro Rokudo, second year student at Kokuyo High. He was tall, handsome, incredibly intelligent, strategic, charming, not loyal to anyone but fearless, not purely evil but close.

Guys wanted to be like him.

Girls wanted to be with him.

And he was Tsunako's. Or, if the vast majority was to be believed, Tsunako belonged to him.

He gently bandaged her knees and then leaned down to press a kiss to them both. His thumbs feathered against her lower thighs.

"Oya ~ I would feel so much better if you would take another shower. You don't know how sticky their filth is once it gets on your skin."

She was still damp from the last three showers, skin berated slightly red from the constant scrubbing of a hand cloth. Tsunako worried the hem of the black bath robe Mukuro had lent her. "R-Rokudo…"

"Hm?"

"T-they were cut up badly…"

She meant her attackers, their limp, just barely living bodies bleeding on the floor. "Yes, they were." Mukuro took her hands in his gloved ones and brought her palms to his lips.

"But you weren't holding a-anything sharp."

"Hhmmm… How curious." He reached into the inside pocket of his jacket and pulled out a small pocket knife. "I can assure you that I had this on my person."

"O-oh…" She frowned. "Sorry, it's just that I, I thought it was weird."

"You were on the ground, being assaulted by garbage. You wouldn't have noticed something as small as this."

'_Maybe he's right,'_ she thought to herself. _'But that doesn't look big enough to make those gashes. And I don't remember that being in his coat when he put it on me. He could have put it in his back pocket or something…'_

She couldn't help feeling, though, that she was being lied to. She reached out for the pocket knife, only to have Mukuro draw it away. "I don't want you touching it… You see, it's covered in their filthy blood."

Now that he mentioned, it, she saw it. The grooved handle was stained and the blade was caked red. Funny how she hadn't noticed it a second ago. "I'm sorry that I'm asking such strange questions."

"It's alright, Tsu-kun. It's just because you're in shock over what happened." He pocketed the knife. "Your memory tends to get skewed when you can't think right."

She nodded and squeezed her eyes tightly shut. _'I can't believe they did that to me during school…'_

He looked up at her, crouched as he was before her, and took her face between his hands. "You can cry now, Tsu-kun. No one's here to see it but me."

She bowed her head into his shoulder and he wrapped his arms around her as the floodgates open.

Their world – not the world in general, not Asia and America and the seas and the oceans and not Russia or Africa or Australia – but their small, two-person world, Tsunako and Mukuro membership only…

Drowned in her tears.

~::~

They called Tsunako a whore.

They called her one so often, she began to think that she was – that, maybe, she was secretly a slut. If that was the truth, then she shouldn't bother trying to refute them.

But she was still loyal. She was in a monogamous relationship with her boyfriend. It wasn't like she could go behind his back and start spreading her legs, even though a voice that sounded menacingly like her bullies at school said that that should be more than easy for her to do.

So she should be able to lie down on her back and let nature take its course. It sounded easy enough, just pretend to feel good even when there was no pleasure and then wait it out – or, at least, that's how the girls at school explained it to each other. They were never talking to her, as she should have known all of this because she was, again, a whore. But it was never hard to overhear their conversations.

Her mom always told her a different story. Blushing, hand to her cheek, ladle to her breast, Nana would go on and on about how good it felt to be with someone you loved, about how shy she had been the first time, about how Tsunako's dad, Iemitsu, had bee so gentle with her and how they had fit together like they had been made with each other in mind.

"_I lost my virginity to your daddy, Tsunako! I plan on growing old, not letting any other man do the things he has done to me."_

But her mom was one voice against dozens of others that said that sex wasn't a big deal – you had it with strangers in the back of cars while a video camera was rolling, so what? Nothing special. It wasn't like true love existed.

"_You would know, wouldn't you, Tsuna-chan? I hear your cute little mouth is out for rent in the restroom!"_

So she tried to be sexy about taking off her clothes as she kept her eyes to the ground and her shoulders slumped forward. Guys liked to know they were totally in control of their girl, so said the other Kokuyo students.

Get as far as showing interest and the men will take it from there.

There she was in Mukuro's small apartment… Proving all of those girls wrong as Mukuro stood from his bed and covered her with a blanket. He leaned down and kissed her oh-so softly, with so much gentleness and care, _she_ thought she was going to break.

"Tsu-kun, what do you think you're doing?" Mukuro's one scarlet red, one azure blue eye studied her carefully through a drowsy haze. "Oya ~ your idea and my idea of sleeping together are two entirely different things, I'm seeing."

She shook. "I-I'm a virgin."

"Yes. I know. Kufufufufu ~ I think it's sexy, knowing that no one's touched you down there…"

Tsunako bit her bottom lip. "So why won't you touch me down there? Why won't you fuck me already, j-just get rid of it for me!"

"Now, now, what are you talking about?" He smoothed his hands up and down her arms.

"I'm a-already a w-w-whore, so why…" She gulped. "W-why won't you have sex w-with me? That's w-what we're supposed t-to do, right?"

He stared down at her for a very long time. Whatever he was thinking was hidden behind his duo-colored gaze and small, default grin that sent chills down her spine.

"No, we're not _supposed_ to do _anything_. We'll do what we want when we want as we want to do it. If we want to wear purple top hats on our feet, then that's what we'll do." He picked her up, him and his fairy tale obsession of whisking away his beautiful princess (and she wondered just how long he would stay with her before going off to find that very special woman), and carried her to bed, tucking her in before sliding in beside her.

He wrapped her up in his arms and tucked her head beneath his chin. "And if we don't want to _fuck_ or _have sex_ any time soon, then we most certainly won't. Personally, I have these very vivid dreams of making long, passionate love to you on the bank of a sparkling lake…" She blushed darkly as his small grin grew into a lecherous smirk. "Your hair will fan out against the white picnic blanket and you'll look at me with those desperate, doe eyes of yours, so lost in pleasure that you'll forget that you're human and claw me –"

"HIIIEEE!" She clasped her hands over his mouth, blood pulsing in her ears as her body quivered with Mukuro's sweet threats. "I-I get it! You don't have to say anything else!"

His wicked leer turned soft in a second. His larger hands curved over hers and he pressed small kisses to her fingertips. "Oya ~ I can't remember the last time I heard you make that cutesy sound."

"W-what?"

"Your 'hiee' sound. It's so adorable, it makes me want to gobble you right up." He nuzzled her palms. "So sad, that I haven't found the perfect lake yet…"

She choked on her own spit and stuffed her face into the junction of his neck and shoulder, unsuccessfully hiding from his cooing laughter.

"Oh, and, Tsu-kun?"

"Y-yeah?"

"If I ever hear you call yourself a whore again, a kitten somewhere in the world will die. Preferably close to home."

"No!"

"It can't be helped." He stroked her back. "After all, even Mother Nature must try to get you to understand just how precious you are."

~::~

Mukuro could have made slaves of the student body. The fact that he chose not to and only kept a few friends endeared him to Tsunako. She couldn't help it – she would rather have few close friends that she could trust over having dozens of people who only cared for her as long as her back wasn't to them.

Ken was a wild boy, suntanned skin and untamable, tangled blonde hair, hazel eyes and a fanged grin – completely animalistic in manner to the point where he chased after cars and his best defense was to bite people he didn't like. He was energetic and puppy-dog-like, loyal without fault to Mukuro and impossible to understand.

Then there was Chikusa, who was Ken's exact opposite. The dead couldn't be as calm as he was, standing there silent as the reaper, watching the world go by without showing a single thought. He wore a white beanie and glasses that always seemed to catch a ray of light and hide his eyes. Occasionally, she saw him playing with a yo-yo.

She didn't like it when that yo-yo came out. She swore, every time it did, someone near Chikusa collapsed and was sent to the hospital.

There was also one of the sensei, Lancia-Sensei, who Mukuro always hung out with between classes. Lancia-Sensei was a scary-looking guy, but she always thought there was more to him. An underlying story as to why he always looked so tired or why she kept getting the urge to yell at him when he tried acting big and tough enough to send his own students to the nurse's office.

Now that she thought about it, M.M., the redheaded girl who took the most joy in torturing her, and Birds-Sensei appeared to be the next two people Mukuro would regularly talk to…

Hadn't they all arrived in her town the same year?

Before she could entertain the thought, a familiar voice barked at her to get moving.

"We're not going to stand here all day, nya! I'm hungryyyyyy!" Ken grabbed her by the scruff of her sweater and dragged her along while Chikusa followed quietly behind them. "You're paying for lunch, girl!"

She blinked up at Ken and he turned his face away, growling low in his throat at her. If she hadn't known any better, or at least learned earlier, she would have thought that he hated her.

Then she figured it out. Ken, big, bad, beast boy of Kokuyo – was secretly shy. She suspected that Chikusa was the same way. How could these tough, undefeatable men be so timid like her? Well, she had a theory.

Because they were tough and undefeatable. Who would want to spend time around people they feared would hurt them? Being alone didn't do any good for one's self-esteem, she would know.

So she smiled sheepishly and nodded. And was secretly happy that her mom gave her extra yen. "What do you two feel like eating?"


	2. My Name Is Alone

Tsunako couldn't open the door. She twisted and pulled and threw her weight against it and tried to break the small, fluted obscure window. Nothing. It was like the door was mocking her, looming over her with its one glass eye.

"Why in such a rush?"

She tried to throw her books through the window and screamed at the top of her lungs. Someone outside the room laughed.

"Tsunako! Don't be so noisy, it's not a terrible thing to have some… sensei-student time… It's really quite fun, very enjoyable, it's…"

Tsunako looked over her shoulder and then whipped right back around to the door, on the verge of tears as she nearly popped her shoulder out of place trying to break down the door. She couldn't unlock it, from the inside or out, without the key and the glass was obviously not going to shatter any time soon.

But Birds-Sensei's pants were already undone. Dumb luck had saved her before when other guys had tried to molest her, but fortune didn't seem to be on her side this time. His perverse grin was only growing as he drew closer to her, blood dripping from his nose. One hand was behind his back as the other reached out for her.

In a second she learned that, for someone so short and unhealthy-looking, he was fast. Faster than she could realize that he had struck out, grasped her by her hair, and that something strong-scented was beneath her nostrils. It flowed right through her head like a chilling breeze and her eyes rolled in their sockets as everything began to blur.

…

She was aware of things clattering to the floor…

…

There was a wooden surface against her back…

…

There was cool air touching her between her legs…

…

Something warm and wet was pulling at her one breast…

…

She couldn't breathe, something long and thick was choking her. What was it? She heaved and her hands weakly came up to pull whatever it was out. She was too weak to move, though – why was that? So she tried to bite down on the obstruction, meaty on her tongue, and thought she heard a yell of pain.

Then something hit her across the face and a distant voice said something, something she couldn't understand…

And then, in a shower of noise she couldn't understand, there was a roar of…

…

…

Rage?

Maybe.

But she was fading out too fast to be sure.

~::~

Birds-Sensei disappeared.

It was a strange case to begin with – his classroom had been spattered in blood, all Birds-Sensei's, from the ceiling to the furthest corners of the cubic space. Someone had meticulously taken the time to paint the room red with what had been Birds-Sensei, was what Tsunako was hearing. Except no one had been able to find Birds-Sensei himself.

The list of suspects was ridiculously long. After the investigation opened up, Birds-Sensei dirty past came to light. He had been wanted in three different countries for crimes against humanity and countless charges of poison, rape, and mafia affiliation. Within Kokuyo alone, several different children, girls and boys, of various ages were discovered to have been his victims, no matter if they had been forced to pose for his child pornography collection or if he had drugged and then raped them.

Tsunako herself had been brought in for questioning. Apparently, Birds-Sensei had been taking pictures of her. Lots of pictures. She had a whole album dedicated to her. Photographs and videos taken of her sitting in class, changing before and after gym, eating lunch, sitting around doing nothing, getting bullied… There were some even more disturbing pictures where she was on her way home or in her room doing things.

The chief investigator surmised that Birds-Sensei name was actually an alias for his ability to train birds to be spy gear – hence the pictures and videos appearing to have been taken from a bird's eye perspective either high in the sky or low to the ground. The police force had even managed to track one such bird down, a microscopic video camera attached to its head. The chief investigator informed her that it had been a canary and then asked her, Have you seen many canaries lately?

She had thought back and remembered more than once seeing feathery puffs of yellow hanging onto power lines or nesting in trees. Trembling, she had answered, Yes. And then had thought to herself, He stalked me with _canaries_.

At one point, the chief investigator had asked her outright if she had killed Birds-Sensei.

No, she had answered.

And then he had asked, Do you know anyone who would want to kill him?

And she had answered, with steely eyes that saw only the small, innocent children that, all over the world, had been ruined by Birds-Sensei's sick desires, _No_.

After two hours of being thoroughly questioned, she was released into the arms of her parents.

Because they knew. It was impossible not to know, after the investigation team had tested the class room for bodily fluids after discovering Birds-Sensei's extracurricular activities.

She had been raped on the teacher's desk. When she had had to go in for the rape kit, she had been told that her hymen was still intact, but she had been orally violated and there was some stretching that suggested that, anally, Birds-Sensei had been preparing to enter.

For nine days, she wasn't allowed outside the house and no one was allowed inside of it.

Her mom was cooking all her favorite meals and constantly going downtown and purchasing the kind of clothes she liked to wear best and the video games she loved to play most.

Her dad got temporary leave from his overseas mining job to stay home. He did nothing but hold her and any attempt to break free was defeated by his sheer strength.

She didn't mind, not really. It meant that she didn't have to go back to school and that she was being spoiled by her parents. So… who _would_ mind?

In her opinion, it wasn't that big a deal. No, those other people mattered more than she did – those children, those poor, innocent boys and girls that had lost something dear to the monster that had been her sensei. After all, she was already a whore, wasn't that common knowledge?

They had been right, those girls that had said that all you had to do was lie there and hand the power over to the guys.

But, at night, with her dad squeezed into her tiny bed and her mom all but lying on top of him for lack of more space, she knew the truth.

She was just happy that she couldn't remember much of anything. Because, when she was done trying to tell herself that it didn't matter what had happened to her, she could still hear that roar of rage.

Mukuro, her hero, her savior, rushing to her side and playing the part of the brave, noble knight as he freed her from the monster's constrictive imprisonment.

Mukuro, her boyfriend, the guy she loved – and he most likely hated her right now. Because why would he love a whore?

No, his avoiding her was answer enough. The fact that she couldn't find him or even Lancia-Sensei or M.M. or Ken or Chikusa – all of them had disappeared as if they had never been, leaving her alone.

She wasn't worth a sparkling lake.

She drowned her lonely, one-person world in dry tears.

~::~

Namimori High was not known for being an accomplished school. There grades were overall average and their sensei were not the most cooperative, much less easy to learn from. As a matter of fact, it was said that their principal was a complete airhead that was all but controlled by his staff.

But one thing Namimori High was known for was being _safe_. Apparently, they had a disciplinary committee that kept people in place. It made a nearly communist environment, and students were reported to have been beaten by the same committee that was supposed to be keeping them safe from harm, but it was just as easy to say that their crime rate was incredibly low if not altogether nonexistent.

Her parents enrolled her there and her dad walked her up to the front gates her first day.

They were two minutes late and a man wearing the disciplinary committee chairman badge stalked up to them and hissed something about biting them to death for their tardiness.

Tsunako had looked up into the stranger's eyes and she swore she thought something flash through them right before the man turned on his heel and dismissed them with a snort.

"Fuck," was what her dad said as he rubbed a huge, meaty hand across his face. "FUCK."

"What's wrong, dad?"

"Well, baby girl, another guy just bit the dust."

She tilted her head, not entirely sure what he meant.

He had smiled tiredly at her. "I wish you knew just how easy it is to fall in love with someone as cute you."

She could have laughed. Fall in love? With _her_? Hilarious. She hadn't, though. Ever since Mukuro had left and taken everything and everyone Tsunako had held dear to her with him, things like happiness, joy, and laughter had dissipated.

She had loved him, damn it. Loved him with all her heart. But one stupid day, one stupid door, one sick fucker later – and it was all torn apart.

Wait, she couldn't think like that.

Obviously, all the blame was hers. She shouldn't have let herself get trapped. She shouldn't have been such a whore.

She hated herself.

~::~

The student body of Namimori was largely formed of minor bad characters. They walked around, acting tough and mean, but Tsunako had gone to Kokuyo and she knew the true look of someone who could really screw up someone else's life.

None of these people could fill that description. Except, maybe, Hibari-san, who was the man who had said something about biting her to death her first day at Namimori.

Once she got past the wannabes, it was still hard to find her place. Maybe it was because she wasn't really looking for a place to begin with. She wanted to be with Mukuro, still, and if she couldn't be with him, she was okay with not being with anyone.

Except everyone else seemed to have something against that.

If they weren't wannabe tough guys, they were tough guys who didn't understand just how tough they were.

"No, it's okay… I don't eat lunch." At least, not since Mukuro and his gang had stopped eating it with her. That wasn't even her being depressing, but a conditioned thing. If Mukuro or Ken and Chikusa hadn't been there to eat lunch with her, someone else would have eaten it for her.

The strange man with the scar through his eyebrow, standing side by side with a small redheaded girl who looked like she could have been Tsunako's twin, glared at her like she was some form of complicated he didn't get.

"Don't eat lunch? Lunch is important for the body to grow big and strong TO THE EXTREME!"

"It's okay, Onii-san," chirped the girl. "Please calm down, I think you're scaring Tsunako-kun."

Anyone would have been scared with that bear of a man yelling in their face. Tsunako gulped and tilted her head down. "Thanks for offering, though…" And then she closed her eyes and hoped they would go away.

She just didn't know what to do with all of this kindness.

When she peeked through her bangs, she saw they were still there, looking curiously down at her.

"What're you doing?" growled the white-haired beast. "ARE YOU PLAYING HIDE AND GO SEEK?"

Then an arm loped around her shoulder with a careless laugh. "Come on, Tsunako! Let's all eat a good lunch together, neh? My old man made extra sushi, so I'll share with you."

Yamamoto Takeshi was someone she did know by name. When he had bumped into her the other day, he had kindly introduced himself and then had somehow tricked her into watching him at baseball practice.

"I'LL SHARE MY RICE BALL! Kyoko-chan made them, so they're delicious TO THE EXTREME!"

"Oh, Onii-san." The redhead, who she thought might be this Kyoko-chan, smiled pleasantly. "Let's all eat a good, healthy lunch."

Tsunako, under the tireless force of all three of them, caved.

The food tasted great, but it lacked something. The company was amazing, but it felt awkwardly incomplete.

She stared morosely at her rice ball and wondered when she would stop waiting for Mukuro to slide back into her life like the prince who saved the princess from eternal loneliness.

~::~

She learned a lot about Hibari Kyouya in her first three weeks at Namimori. Or, at least, she learned what little was known about him plus a lot of what other people had made up about him out of fear and terror and jealousy.

He drove a motorcycle and owned a mansion two miles away from school. He had apparently eaten his parents as a child and also appeared to have the local police force bought off. His hobby was making sure dead bodies were never found again and devouring babies for sustenance.

Tsunako doubted a lot of what she heard, but she managed to sift through it in her boredom till she thought she had a basic idea of who the man behind the tonfas really was.

It helped when, one day, she saw him up a tree saving a stranded kitten.

This was what she was supposed to be afraid of? This was a man worth running away from?

Tsunako had met men and women alike ten times worse. Hibari Kyouya was, to her, just another kind person at Namimori… if not painfully inhibited.

And she met painfully as in other people suffered for how shy he was. In that way, he reminded her of Ken.

It wasn't four afternoons later that she went looking for him only to find him "biting to death" some graffiti artists who had thought that penises was an acceptable wallpaper for Namimori's left wing corridor.

Bodies limp on the ground around him, he spun around to face her, still in battle mode no doubt.

The cold look in his eyes made her think of Mukuro. At the same time, she saw Mukuro nowhere in the creature that was the chairman of the disciplinary office.

"Sorry for interrupting you, Hibari-san." She held out the squirming, prickly bundle that had been, till that moment, coddled dangerously close to her breast. "I don't know what to do with it, so I, I thought of you."

Wordlessly, he took the burden from her and held the small, shivering baby in the palm of his hand. Its dark eyes looked glossily up at Hibari before it curled into itself.

"It's a hedgehog," he stated blankly. Then looked up at her.

It took her a moment to realize he had just prompted her to tell him why she had handed him such an animal. "W-well, I saw it on the side of the road a-and there was a larger hedgehog, umm…" She licked her lips and gave the baby a considerate look. "kind of… flat. So I thought it didn't have anywhere to go and y-you're good with animals…"

"You assumed that I would want a hedgehog."

She flinched. "I, I just thought you would know what to do with it more than I would."

"You expect me to kill it?"

"Hiiee! No one said anything about killing it!"

Hibari blinked at her. She slapped her hands over her mouth.

She needed to work on that squeal.

"… Thank you, Sawada Tsunako. I will decide what to do with it."

And then he turned around and walked away.

As easy as that.

The next day, a small hedgehog was seen riding on Hibari's shoulder as he stalked the school looking for rule breakers.

"It's actually really cool!" Yamamoto chirped at lunch. "Who would have thought that he had a thing for animals, right?"

Tsunako carefully bit into her sandwich and said nothing.

Mukuro had had a thing for flowers.

~::~

It was Valentine's Day. Exactly seven weeks since she had last seen or heard of Mukuro and his misfit gang.

She and Mukuro had had one other Valentine's Day where Mukuro had invited her over the night before the holiday and they had stayed up the entire night, failing to make chocolates but having fun trying. Between every batch of disappointment, they had shared kisses and watched _Godfather_ on TV.

She wouldn't get to be with him for it this year, though, now would she? She walked to school that morning expecting a horrid experience –

Only to be stopped at the front gate, not even late to class, by none other than the school prefect.

"Hibari-san….?"

"Herbivore," he had snapped, seeming unusually irate as he dropped something in front of her and then walked away without an explanation.

It was a small heart-shaped box of expensive chocolates. Tsunako carefully picked it up and continued to class, bemused.

Yamamoto gave her a bento with heart and cupid-shaped sushi inside, blushing and grinning foppishly as he did so.

Ryohei screamed something along the lines of "BE MY VALENTINE" before shoving what had to be the world's biggest teddy bear into her arms.

Kyoko had laughed at her shocked expression.

That night, she went home….

Happy.

~::~

It had to have happened at some point.

Girls were evil, no matter where Tsunako went. And once they found something to sink their wicked claws into, there was no mercy.

"I heard some girl got raped at Kokuyo High," said one girl to her gaggle of four others.

"You mean that Tweet-Sensei?"

"I thought his name was Birds?"

"Does it really matter?" the second asked the third, who demurely admitted that it didn't.

The fourth thought about it for a moment before announcing to her fellow harpies, "I heard that she was leading him on."

There was silence.

"… Whore."

Then they all laughed and talked about the girl who must have been trying to get better grades by screwing her sensei. Or maybe she had done it for lesser reasons.

Tsunako turned on her heel, bangs shielding her expression, and walked straight into Ryohei, who held her tightly and then handed her off to Yamamoto who hummed in her ear and whispered, "It's okay, you can cry", as Ryohei went off after the girls in a fit.

Because, at Namimori, you just don't say things like that. Even though Ryohei and Yamamoto had no clue who the girls were talking about, they wouldn't stand for it.

They just thought that Tsunako was upset by what they had said.

She looked up and saw over Yamamoto's shoulder at the silently guarding Hibari.

Always silently guarding.

Like a knight.

Or more like a dragon.


	3. My Name Is Princess

Hibari found her between classes and demanded that she follow him.

She did so with a small, high-pitched "Hieee?"

He led her outside into the courtyard, stood her under the shade of a tree on the opposite side of the trunk from the school, making them out of sight, and stared at her for a very awkwardly long minute.

"Umm… Hibari-san?"

He blinked at her. She had the thought that maybe he had trailed off into his own little one-person world. "Sawada Tsunako, I have a proposition for you."

That was rare. Hibari usually didn't proposition people as much as he bit them to death for whatever reason he saw fit (or, in better terms, unfit).

"Okay... What is it?"

He tilted his head down, fists clenched at his sides, and looked halfway between murder and simply leaving.

Oh, wait, he was… bowing? Tsunako cupped a hand to her mouth, surprised.

"… _Please_… Go on a… _date_ with me… … … ?"

Her heart stuttered. What could she say? What _could_ she say? There was nothing to say.

She loved Mukuro. Even if she should get over him, even if accepting Hibari's offer could possibly help her do so, she knew she didn't want to.

Because there was only one two-person world she wanted to be a part of.

"I'm sorry, bu – HIIEEE!"

Hibari's tonfas came out instantly, like they had always been in his hands, before he paused and eyeballed Tsunako's reason for screaming with less than enthusiasm. "You're not a Namimori student."

The smell of flowers and mist was powerful. Tsunako reached up and gently touched the sleeved arm around her shoulders. There was no way…

"Kufufufufu ~ and you're not man enough for _my_ Tsu-kun."

Hibari hissed through his teeth. "I'll bite you to death! …!" Hibari took a step back and stared at her with wide eyes.

She had no doubt that he was clueless on how to handle a crying girl.

"R-Roku-…" Tsunako turned in the arms that held her. Looking down at her through one azure blue eye, the other scarlet orb obscured by a fall of blue bangs, was her hero. Her savior.

Her prince.

Her face split into a grin. "Rokudo!"

He cupped her jaw in one gloved hand, thumb brushing away her tears. "Oya ~ what is with this crying? Surely you knew I would be coming back for you."

She pulled back her fist and smashed it into his handsome face, nearly knocking him sideways. "You ASSHOLE! I had n-no clue you were coming b-back. I don't e-even know where you w-went! A-All I know is why y-you left…"

He gingerly touched his newly forming bruise. "Are you sure you know why I left, Tsu-kun? Wait, don't answer that yet." He gave Hibari a very pointed look.

The prefect stood there, staring right back at him with tonfas raised and eyes narrowed hatefully.

"… I see. Some people are simply too dense to get the hint. Kufufufufu ~ then _we'll_ leave. Have a good day… whatever your name is."

Hibari gritted his teeth and leapt forward. "Fucking herbivore!"

Tsunako had never heard Hibari curse before. Then again, she could only imagine what it felt like to watch the very person she had just asked on a date be swept up into the arms of another person.

Princess-style, of course. And Mukuro was running away with a furious prefect hot on their heels.

"Hiieee! He's chasing us!"

"Not for long!" Mukuro sped around a corner, made another sharp left, and then pushed Tsunako between his body and the brick surface of one of Namimori's walls.

Which Tsunako thought strange because she had never noticed this little alcove in the school's structure before. Mukuro pressed a secretive finger to his lips before leaning down and kissing her softly. Then with more pressure as a familiar hunger began to boil in Tsunako's belly – most likely the same sort of fire that burned in Mukuro's – and her hands dug into his shoulders as a shadow passed by the shallow niche they were hiding in without appearing to notice it.

How hadn't Hibari seen them?

'_I shouldn't question good luck'_, she thought to herself as her knees got weak and her body prickled with want. _'Rokudo is back, he's here with me, and I'm so confused and angry and happy and scared… I don't understand how I can feel so much at one time.'_

She turned her head away, gasping for air as Mukuro found interest in drawing strange designs down her throat with his tongue. "R-Rokudo…"

"Kufufufufu ~ my Tsu-kun…. You haven't changed at all. Have you missed me?"

In an instant, fury overcame everything and she shoved him away. "Of course, you baka!"

"So now I'm a baka? Are you going to hit me again?"

"Yes! A-and no…" That had actually really hurt.

Mukuro chuckled. "Tsu-kun ~ "

"_Don't_…" Her bangs fell into her expression as she dipped her head low. "Don't. J-just tell me… where you went…"

"First, tell me why you think I left."

She flinched and swallowed thickly. "You didn't want to be with me anymore, r-right? Because everyone was r-right and I'm a whore…"

"A kitten, somewhere in the world, just died, Tsu-kun." He tangled a hand in her hair and forced her to look up. "That isn't the reason I left at all. If it were, why would I come back to you? No, no, no ~ you've got it all wrong."

She hoped he was joking about that kitten. "T-then why did… Why did you leave…?"

"You?" Mukuro supplied gently.

She flinched. "_Yes_."

He edged his way closer and put one hand against the wall on one side of her head while the other came around her waist and held her as if she was something fragile about to shatter. "I can't tell you where I went or why I went there – you're better off not knowing, trust me on that.

But I didn't want to go. Every second I was gone, I wanted to be right here with you. Kufufufufu ~ even the boys were complaining about going so long without seeing you." Mukuro smiled down at her with that old charm that she remembered.

"… Was it because of Birds-Sensei?"

His body went rigid against hers, even while that ever present smile refused to disappear. "He was no sensei."

"Did it have something to do with him?"

She had never felt a silence be so cold and dense before. "I should have killed him the moment I met him," he hummed and noon in February felt like Antarctica in December. "But he was only a small part of it."

'_I want to ask more, like a small part of what? What can't he tell me? Why did everyone have to move away? But he looks so uncomfortable…' _ Tsunako pushed her head against his shoulder. "You're not leaving again, right? Please, Rokudo, _please_… Please don't leave again."

"Please don't leave _you_ again?"

She nodded pitifully.

Mukuro said he had missed her this entire time, but she just couldn't believe him. She couldn't believe that he hadn't been able to find someone else to like and had left poor, whoring Tsunako in the dust. It was great that he was back – but for how long?

He knew she was filthy and she knew he liked clean girls. Her heart ached but she had to face the facts: there was absolutely _no way_ Mukuro still liked her.

She had never been the princess to his prince anyway.

"Oya ~ leaving once was bad enough, I don't want to go through the annoyances of it again. No, I am definitely not leaving _you_ again." His hands held her face as he pulled her back and butted their foreheads together. She watched his heterochromic eyes close, a softness relaxing his expression. "Nope. Being with you sounds perfect. My Tsu-kun… My _princess_." He took a step back and knelt before her. He took both her hands in his and kissed each knuckle. "I am no prince, or even a knight in shining armor. More or less, you could say I am the evil wizard bent on making the princess mine. So will you let me capture you and keep you, my princess?"

She trembled as his eyes opened and found hers. "I'm not a princess…"

"You're my princess."

"I'm no one's princess."

"Mine."

She shook her head. "P-Princess or not… I don't think you can capture someone who willingly follows."

"Then follow me."

"I can do that."

~::~

She could do that. And she did.

Mukuro got her in a blue Crossover before driving to the plane station. He blindfolded her and led her by touch and voice to First Class.

She had no clue where they were going, but Mukuro held her hand the entire flight and she thought that, maybe, they could be going to Hell and it wouldn't matter as long as he didn't let go.

"When you said follow, I didn't know you meant out of Japan." She found his shoulder and rested her head on it.

"Kufufufufu ~ is there a problem with that?"

"No… It's just that everyone at home is going to be worried now."

"Oh, yes. Them. I may have forgotten to mention that you dad knows that you're with me."

"He _does_? Wait, does he only know or did he have a say in this?"

"He tried to have a say in it. He likes me even less now than on the day he met me."

"That's because I'm his baby girl." Tsunako flushed at the argument she and her dad had had that first night after he had met Mukuro as her boyfriend. "He doesn't want 'any bad boy' stealing me away." Iemitsu, that giant of a man, had even cried.

"… Right. Well, there's that." He pressed a kiss to her forehead. "And then there's that he's one of the few that know how much of a bad boy I am."

She thought of Birds-Sensei and the scene of the crime.

Back when she had been on the ground in Japan, safely in school with Hibari on the hunt for Mukuro's blood, sounded like it would have been a good place to stay. Because who would follow someone who could do that to another person?

That answer seemed easy enough: Sawada Tsunako would.

She curled up in her seat and he wrapped her up in his arms across the armrest, producing a blanket from somewhere and tucking her in with it. "Sleep, Tsu-kun. I'll wake you up when we get there."

"Where's there?"

"Kufufufufu ~ you'll find out soon enough."

~::~

He told her to take off her shoes the moment the car stopped.

Still blindfolded, she did so and then he came around and opened her door, took her hand in his and helped her down. Soft, soft grass tickled her feet and he hummed a soft melody beneath his breath as he led her somewhere on foot.

After hours on a plane and then even more time in a car, her legs weren't up for a long trek. It felt like the moment they took five steps away from the car she would collapse. But she held in there because his wordless lullaby sounded so happy and his hand, ungloved, was cold and damp around hers.

'_He's nervous,'_ she realized. _'I never knew Rokudo could get nervous.'_

"Come with me, princess, let me lead you to a faraway land where unicorns prance and rainbows end in gold…"

She laughed. She couldn't stop herself. "That's corny, Rokudo."

"Corny makes you happy. Just look at your blush."

"I can't, remember?" But her heart was warm and fast in her chest, a testament to what Mukuro said.

"Come with me, princess, let me lead you to a distant haven where the blue waters sparkle like crystals and there's not a person but us for miles…"

Her breath caught. "H-hiiee?"

His lips touched the back of her hand. "I found it. It took me awhile, it isn't even as perfect as I wished it to be, but it exists and it's as close to perfection as this entire world can get."

"A-are w-we going to…"

"I hope so. In the end, you're the one who makes that call."

She already knew what her answer was. Chances were he knew it too.

"Come with me and dreams will come true ~ "

"But they've already come true," she said suddenly.

"Have they now?"

"Yes." She stopped walking and he stopped with her. She pulled him closer and rested her hand over his less-than steady heart. "If we stood here all day without doing anything, I would be really happy."

"Well then." He tilted her head up and kissed her. "Let's make you even happier, neh?"

And then he slid her blindfold off.

Beautiful was not a good enough word to describe where she was. She saw the distant climb of purple mountains against the endless expanse of blue sky, painted with cotton balls of white. The sun beamed down upon the breathtaking scenery with a single-mindedness to only make it look more ethereal than humanly possible, casting shadows against forest greens and browns and light upon the body of water that met her gaze.

It sparkled like it was crested with diamonds, a clear, clean blue that lapped lazily at the low, sandy bank circling it.

Mukuro wrapped his arms around her waist and rested his chin on her shoulder. "What do you think?"

There weren't words to describe what she thought – she could tell him word for word just what she saw, but it would never come close to doing the landscape justice. Her hands found his and clenched around them as she sucked in a deep, fresh breath.

His hands dipped beneath her shirt and rested against her belly. "Kufufufufu ~ I understand completely how you feel. I often face the same dilemma trying to describe a greater beauty."

What greater beauty? There was something more beautiful than this? She turned his head and his duo-colored gaze was focused only on her.

She flushed scarlet red.

"Come, my princess – let's make memories here." And from behind his back, he produced –

A white picnic blanket.

"That is, if you want to." His smirk was wicked.

"You know I do."

"Are you positive?"

"Yes."

"Flawless certainty?"

"Yes."

"But will you one day re-"

She spun around and smacked her lips against his, shutting him up. It hurt somewhat, considering that their noses became fatalities along the way and her teeth clacked against his in that first second of contact, but she didn't dare break away and he didn't back down.

His tongue slipped past her lips and brought with it the taste of pineapples and dew.

It felt like they stood there for an eternity, searching and probing and playing, hands tight on each other, eyes closed as they savored only each other – their small, two-person world.

She broke away eventually, though, because she was an oxygen-breathing creature and everything was starting to blur together. She took a step back, Mukuro watching her with hazy, wanton eyes, lips as bruised as hers, and began unbuttoning her shirt.

"I'm sure this time."

"I'm glad to hear it."

~::~


	4. My Name Is Tsunako

Some faraway part of her wondered just what the picnic blanket was made of. It wasn't cotton, too soft, too light, but it couldn't be silk. So what was it, her naked skin tried to determine. What could it be?

But then her flesh found something else to be more interested in, swamping her mind with sensation, every muscle in her body quivering, every bone aching, every nerve ending on fire.

Hands floated down her sides, curving towards her hips, and then slipping down her thighs towards her knees.

Mukuro gave her a naughty look as he pushed one leg over his shoulder and nipped her inner thigh, marking it with small red mars against her creamy skin. "It's so hard to not just devour you whole… How can someone taste so delicious?"

She had no clue. Honestly, no clue. She had never really thought to taste herself before (and didn't that just sound incredibly dirty?).

But she was overjoyed that he was willing to sample. He looked so handsome and _sexy_ with that countenance of devious want stitched into his expression, darkening his eyes and flushing his cheeks, blue hair coming undone from its strange spiky design to weave around his angular face and shoulders.

This was making him happy, to make her feel good. And that just made it so much better to give and take without feeling the shame and despair she thought she would. All of those girls at Kokuyo, they obviously had had no clue what they were talking about.

There was no possible way she could just lie there and let him do all the work himself. If she stayed still and even tried to do so, she would have gone mad. Instead, she writhed and moaned and cried out and her nails bit into his back and chest and arms as she scrabbled for something to hold onto, something real and immovable.

He rubbed his fingers against her most intimate place and she was _done_. Her eyes rolled into the back of her head and she screamed his name as her body erupted. She just exploded! That was the end of Sawada Tsunako, who had died happily in the arms of the man that she loved.

"Kufufufufu ~ your body is so innocent, Tsu-kun. We haven't even gotten started yet and you've already climaxed." He pressed his lips to her ear. "Don't leave me behind so soon."

She gulped and nodded and wiggled her toes just to make sure she could. Her body tingled strangely, hypersensitive as Mukuro trailed kisses down her body to her already molested nipples. He kissed one perky bud before suckling from the other.

"R-Rokudoooo…" Her hands went to his hair and tangled in the cool, light wisps of blue. "Rokudo!" She gasped and keened as his hand, still between her legs, began to rub again, slick with her juices. Her heart thumped at the thought.

Her body went ramrod stiff, arching off the blanket, mouth falling open, eyes impossibly wide, as a single finger slipped between her folds… _inside of her_.

'_I, I can't think… I… This is…'_ "So good…"

"Good," Mukuro murmured against his pink treat. And then he travelled lower, tongue following the curves of her breast till they dipped between every rib and fell into the slope of her belly. He seemed to be incredibly fond of her naval.

And that one finger was moving. Curling inside of her, twisting around, it was as if her entire being was focused at that one point in her body. Then that finger stretched and it touched something that sent of jolt of discomfort through her.

"W-wait, Rokudo…"

"There it is." He trailed his hair against her saliva-moistened skin, startling her with a flash of pleasure. "Your virginity at the tip of my finger…"

"Take it."

He looked up at her through his bangs and she smiled at him. "I love you… So, please…" She fiddled with his hair nervously. "I-If I really am y-your _princess_, then I, I order you to, to…"

"Make you mine?"

"Y-yes."

"Kufufufufu ~ don't you know? The evil wizard obeys no one's whim." He stretched up her body, his hand leaving her most intimate place, and kissed her with all the gentleness and care that could ever be bestowed upon another. "But maybe just this once, neh? Because it is _my_ princess who orders me and how could I go against my heart?"

"S-so corny…"

"You love it."

She did.

He spread her legs and nestled his hips down in the cradle of them. He used one hand to guide his manhood to her entrance while the other held his weight up next to her waist. She clung him with all of her strength, face pressed to his thundering heart. _'It feels like it's going as fast as mine is…'_

"You need to relax, Tsu-kun, so that this won't hurt as much."

She nodded and took a deep breath.

Tsunako felt his head first, rubbing against her entrance, his pre-cum wet against her damp lips. And then he slipped… _into her_.

Her nails bit into his lower back as she was stretched beyond imagination. It burned, not in a painful way, but not in a good way either.

He paused for a second. "This is going to hurt for a moment, Tsu-kun."

"I, I know."

"Don't hesitate to give me your pain. Bite, claw, it will be okay, neh?"

"O-okay…"

He kissed her as he swiveled his hips and thrust, breaking through her last proof of innocence. She cried out into his mouth, bloody grooves forming where her fingers had caught on his skin, and just barely managed to not bite through his tongue.

It really did hurt.

"There you go, Tsu-kun… You're so tight and warm, this must be what home feels like… My home. My princess. _Mine_."

She nodded. Because she was finally, without being an object but a person, happy to be his. "I love you…"

"You're my heart," he whispered back. "How could anyone be as precious as you?" He bucked carefully, testing her response, and when she groaned, he pushed deeper. She arched off the blanket and gasped. "It's impossible."

Their hands wove together, fingers intertwined, above her head as he built a rhythm between them, slow and uncoordinated at first but quickly becoming fluent.

She looked him in the eye with the last bit of sanity she had left. "It's not… B-because you're precious t-to me too."

~::~

The fear struck her in the afterglow of what they had done. Not that it would be a terrible thing, but it would definitely be bad timing a-and they still had to finish school and they were still so young with so much ahead of them…

"I'm sterile," Mukuro said, striking her suspicions with a fatal blow. "Even if we wanted to have children, it would be impossible."

"Oh. Oh…" She petted his hair out of his face and frowned. "I see…"

He smiled mirthlessly down at her. "You would have made an incredible mother in good time. To see your belly swell with our child would have been…" He trailed off as he looked distantly inward, stroking her side. "It would have been an experience."

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be. I actually find it amusing, the things I can do and yet I can't do anything about myself."

"What are you talking about?"

"Nothing, nothing… Just post-orgasm nonsense. It happens to everyone. Oya ~ you should try it."

She butted her forehead against his, closing her eyes. "I can't think of anything to say. A part of me is too happy to sleep, but the other part just wants to close my eyes and never wake up in case this is a dream."

"Do you have dreams like this?"

"All the time. I missed you so much when you were gone. So much!"

He kissed the tip of her nose. "I'm back now. I'm not leaving you again, remember? I would be a fool too, especially with the admirers you have now."

"You mean Hibari-san?"

"Is that his name?"

"Yeah. He's the chairman of Namimori High's Disciplinary Committee." She felt sorry for turning him down. She could only imagine how much effort he had had to put into approaching her, being as proud and shy as he was. "But he's just one guy, what do you mean by admirer_s_?"

"Oya ~ I think the most difficult thing I'm ever going to have to teach you is just how irresistible you are. If there is one, I can assure you that there are plenty more, just waiting for you to turn their way and give them the time of day."

She thought about Yamamoto and Ryohei. But they were just friends, so it was okay, right? Then again… suddenly, that Valentine's Day didn't seem so innocent.

Mukuro rolled onto his back and pulled her over his chest, always touching her in the most treasuring of ways. "Now, sleep, Tsu-kun. You can't wake up from reality."

~::~

Having the whole gang back was like realizing that she hadn't minded having an extra, unresponsive limb that occasionally spastically hindered her, just in time to tell the surgeon to stop cutting it off.

The moment Ken and Chikusa saw them, their demeanors changed.

For one, Ken started yelling at her, screaming at her to be stronger and not be so forward and, damn it, _stop smiling at me_! These were, apparently, all the things she had needed to do against Birds – except that last one. By that last command, he had looked flustered and red in the face and she couldn't have stopped herself from laughing if she had tried.

Chikusa had taken a much calmer approach and simply patted her head, telling her that it was good that she was okay.

Lancia-Sensei had been there for some reason too. She had no clue why the sensei would be hanging around with Mukuro's gang of boys, but he had smiled grimly for her and handed her a ring, telling her to keep it on her always as a token of his gratitude.

A token of gratitude for what?, she had asked.

Lancia-Sensei had glanced subtly at Mukuro before turning back to her and saying, Simply for being who you are.

She was secretly happy that M.M. hadn't shown her face.

The gang, minus Mukuro, came over to her house the day they returned from wherever they had gone. Her dad was home, looking uncharacteristically serious and ruthless as he had given the group of four the world's darkest glare.

She wasn't sure why, but she had the slightest inkling that her dad didn't like her friends for reasons that didn't include Mukuro being her boyfriend. But what other reason was there? Besides the fact that they all attended Kokuyo and Kokuyo was the root of all of her bad memories. And the fact that they just _oozed_ badass. …

Wait, were those the reasons?

No, because Tsunako had seen her dad act friendlier to a burglar brandishing a handgun once than he acted around her friends.

Even more confusing, her friends seemed to hold an equally if not larger dislike for her dad. But, _why_? Only Lancia-Sensei appeared to hold any respect in Iemitsu, taking a seat next to him at the kitchen table and beginning a halfway domestic conversation while shooing them with the other hand.

Ken, Chikusa, and she played video games into the wee hours of the morning.

It wasn't till she woke up, Ken snoring on the ground and Chikusa propped up against the wall while she had, at some point, been placed in her bed, that it occurred to her that mom had not been home.

How far did her dad's distrust in her friends go?

The gang enrolled in Namimori and seeing Mukuro's gang and her friends integrate… well. Horror and humor had never before come together in such harmony.

Ken tried to bite off Yamamoto's batting arm – nearly succeeded – only to be terrified of Ryohei and his demands for him to join the Boxing Club he was captain of. Kyoko seemed to enjoy Chikusa's silent company as well. And then there was Lancia-Sensei, who Yamamoto took an instant liking to (he seemed the type to befriend anyone who looked severe enough). For some reason, Yamamoto suspected that Lancia-Sensei was hiding a mean right curveball behind his frown.

Tsunako decided not to ask.

The only person who eventually did not enjoy the new arrangement at all was Hibari-san. He still talked to Tsunako…. Sometimes. Usually, he just nodded his head at her and then walked away. But when it came to the new students stepping a toe out of line, he was there in a flash to tie them down in a bundle and throw them right back behind it.

Or, to use his favorite quote, Bite them to death.

~::~

Tsunako sighed and cuddled down into Mukuro's pillow, waiting for her boyfriend to get back from the market with ice cream and a movie.

She was hoping he would pick a comedy. But she knew him better than she knew herself and, by the time he was destined to return, she was dead certain they would be watching a horror movie. Why? Because she hated horror movies, _hated_ them; they did their job and actually horrified her, which was terrible when one such as herself was watching a horror movie with such a person as Mukuro, who thought the genre in general was nearly the same thing as the comedy category.

Besides, he _would_ want her getting scared – because when she got scared, she climbed all over him. That amused him more than any movie could.

Asshole.

Then she smiled into the cushion. Well, she hated horror movies; but at least it undoubtedly brought them closer together.

Who knew, maybe she could trick him into making comfort love. Oh, she was so sneaky!

She heard the front door unlock. "Tsu-kun, I'm back ~ Are you where I left you?"

She was out of bed so fast, the sheets tangled around her ankles and slammed her into the floor.

After a few painful moments of saying an intimate hello to the floor, she looked up to see feet in front of her. Following them up long legs, she eventually saw Mukuro's twinkling eyes fondly staring down at her. "This is not where I left you at all."

"Yeah, well… Help?" She held out a hand and he took it, swinging her up and off the ground and into the cradle of his arms. Princess-style. "Hiieee! You really don't have to keep doing that!"

"Oya ~ what do you mean? What am I doing?"

"This carrying kink of yours!"

"What carrying kink?"

"You're always carrying me around!"

"I am? How strange, I've never noticed."

Of course he hadn't. She glared at him as he sat down on the couch and arranged her comfortably in his lap. When his only response was to smile joyfully at her, she knew she had to give in and did so with a sigh. "What are we watching?"

He tucked a thin blanket around them as his other hand went to the remote. He must have popped the movie in before checking on her. "It's a classic."

"… Okay… What's it called?"

His smile was too angelic. "_A Nightmare On Elm Street_!"

She eyeballed him suspiciously. "I've never heard of it."

"Prepare to meet the true face of classic horror."

She met it. Quite frankly, after trying three different times to crawl _through_ Mukuro, she was done meeting it.

Mukuro grabbed her the fourth time she tried to squeeze the life out of her and sent them both the ground, him over her. "Kufufufufu!" he laughed uncontrollably. "Kufufufufu!"

"I-it's not fun – HIIEEEEEEE!" She buried her face in his chest as Freddy Krueger went about doing what he did best to teenagers and their dreams. "Rokudo!"

He petted her gently. "Oya ~ let me put your fears to rest, Tsu-kun." He kissed her as a character screamed in the background.

Oh, yeah. She was _so_ sneaky. Did it count if he brought it up first? She swallowed thickly and trembled. "O-okay… but f-first, please turn t-that off…"

"Only because it is my princess that asks."

Silence envelopes the room as he kisses her again, deeper, and his hands wander beneath her clothes. _'But how did he turn off the TV…?'_ Tsunako asked herself.

When he sat up and shouldered off his cameo shirt, leaving his chest open for her speculation, she decided it didn't matter.

Not in their two-person world.

~::~

_Author's Note: Let me explain what sort of AU this is – Tsuna is a girl, obviously. And she has not been predestined to be Vongola 10th, again, obviously enough. But that doesn't mean that the Vongola does not exist in this story. I hope a majority of my readers got the hints I dropped along the way._

_The reason why Mukuro and gang are in Namimori and not Gokudera or Reborn or Lambo? Well, simply put, Tsunako is still part of the mafia, whether she knows of it or not. And she is still the granddaughter of an Italian Don; plus, her dad still plays a huge part in the safety of the mafia because his position as CEDEF (notice how, in the story, Tsunako only knows of his cover job? The reason why she doesn't think he's dead is because that, in the manga, Iemitsu does eventually return home and so did Iemitsu in this story)._

_Gokudera didn't come to Japan till Reborn told him to come. Lambo came to Japan to follow Reborn. But if Reborn isn't tutoring Tsuna (or Tsunako in this case), then why would Reborn come at all? Iemitsu certainly wouldn't be conducting mafia business so close to home._

_I thought I would give a hand at having mafia without having Tsuna knowingly be mafia._

_Fun, isn't it?_

_But now Mukuro's uncharacteristically romantic to someone _he_ knows is part of the mafia… Should I write a prequel explaining how it turned from being a mission of world domination into a love story? I know I should, but I don't even know if I can…_


End file.
